hal tweets ·7:42 AM
A short piece I wrote for AOLnews about why Peep culture trumps privacy online. http://bit.ly/bQECsC
Culture
2008,
18:36 GMT
Portrait of a Blogger on the Darkside
Posted by: Hal
Not really. In fact Padme, the primary author of the blog Journey to the Darkside is sweet as can be. Even over the phone with her I thought she was going to offer me milk and cookies. And blog posts with titles like Victoria Anniversary Night and Happy 7th Birthday Skywalker! don’t exactly come across as dangerous.
But innocuous fare about trips and birthday parties quickly gives way to posts like “The First Time I Sucked Two Cocks in One Night” and “Darth Vader is My Daddy”. What gives? I ended up on the phone with the very kind Padme (not, obviously, her real name) and found out the following:
Padme’s husband is also her master. He makes all the decisions and regularly spanks or whips her with a riding crop. This is part of Padme’s life and she blogs about it almost as matter of factly as she blogs about recovering from surgery and celebrating her wedding anniversary. One suspects, though, that it is the details of her sex life that have caused the site to get over a million-and-a-half visits since its inception three years ago.
Part of Padme wants to get exposed. In her emails to me she refers to the blog as private even though she knows as well as I do that the blog is a public document open to all. When I ask her about this she says: “It’s a public blog and there’s always a risk with that. I have heard stories of other bloggers being found out by their families, but we’ve been pretty lucky, so far no one has come across it. I’ve been kind of worried from the beginning about that. You almost half expect that someone will come up to you and say ‘I know who you are.’ “
Well Padme doesn’t just half expect it, I get the feeling she half wants it to happen. After all, this blog is very detailed and anyone who knows this couple even casually would probably be able to put two and two together.
So why take the risk? It’s pretty clear that Padme has come to rely heavily on the blog as a source of community, friendship, creativity and attention. As she tells me: “I don’t drive, I don’t work, I’m a stay-at-home mom and I’m alone all day. It’s been a great way to connect to people.”
Somehow, Padme is able to ignore the fact that she knows very little about the 3000 people a day who read her blog. She talks to me about overcoming embarrassment and writing as if it was just Master who would be reading. When I ask her if she thinks it’s odd that thousands of strangers know more about her life than neighbours, friends and family she seems momentarily flustered. Finally she tells me that, at the end of the day, the pros outweigh the cons and she simply “tries not to think about the lurkers.”
2008,
1:31 GMT
Guy Sells His Twitter Account on Ebay
Posted by: Hal
So here’s an interesting little tale. This guy Andrew Baron sold his Twitter account on Ebay a few days ago. I don’t know how much he got for it but a blog that reports on Twitter doings reported that at one point the bid was up to $1,125.00 USD. As Andrew Baron had 1,636 followers, the blog notes that each of his followers are worth 0.69 USD at the very least.
So I guess the question is: how much is a good account worth? I’ve got 500 Facebook friends, should I cash in? Deal or no deal? It’s sort of like buying a World of Warcraft character that’s already been built up to have tons of extra powers. Something like that. Anyway, from a peep perspective many interesting questions are raised, mostly around how much dedicated followers with a demonstrated ongoing interest in peeping your life are worth.
For the record, here’s what Andrew put up on Ebay about selling his account: “It would be silly to just delete this account I have here, especially if there is someone out there that had like interests and had something to say or wanted to get involved in some relevant conversations. In terms of monetary value, I have no expectations or needs at all so I decided not to put a minimum bid on this. Whatever will be, will be.”
2008,
14:46 GMT
WebCam in the Car
Posted by: Hal
Great piece in the Washington Post today about a pilot project that looks at how installing webcams in the cars of teenage drivers might reduce accidents and unsafe behaviour. Of course, what's fascinating is what else it might do -- condition young people to accept that they should be watched all the time every time lest they hurt themselves or someone else.
2008,
15:19 GMT
Facebook Obsession and Indie Writers Deathmatch
Posted by: Hal
Okay it’s time to admit that I’m currently obsessed with Facebook. I’m spending way too much time on good old FB. What am I doing on there? Nothing of consequence whatsoever. Adding then deleting applications. Looking at random people’s pictures. Answering my FB messages. (A young woman today sent me a message through FB saying that she just wrote a 2 hour exam based on my article about my failed FB party.) I’m also chatting using that annoying pop up chat thing. I’ll chat with anyone! I’m a chat slut! It’s got to stop, but will it?
In order to justify my obsession with FB, I decided to try out their advertising feature so I could pretend I was doing business. I created an ad for Broken Pencil Magazine’s short story contest Indie Writers Deathmatch. It was actually quite interesting. You can target by age, country, education and interests. The ad is currently aimed at Canadians ages 16-45 who indicate writing and creative writing as interests or hobbies on their profile. I created the ad last night and so far today there’s been 12,029 impressions, and 11 clicks. I’ve spent $3.77 of BP’s money for those 11 clicks, an average of 31 cents a click. (I’ve capped it at $10 a day.)
As a advertiser, I like how targeted I can get. And as a consumer I think it’s also valuable – you’re a creative writer, so you get an ad for a creative writing contest. At the same time, there are drawbacks both practical and philisophical. On the practical side, clicking the ad takes you to the Facebook group. You then have to go from there to the actual contest page in order to find out all the details and enter your short story. So that’s one extra step which is a drawback (unlike, say, a Google Ad which would take you directly to the page you want people to go to). I have no way of knowing, ultimately, how many people actually go from the FB group to the Broken Pencil Death Match page.
More abstractly, this kind of advertising simply enhances what we already know but often chose to ignore: that the stuff we put up there to tell our FB friends about our lives can be used by just about anyone as marketing fodder. Even your social decisions – for instance if you say you are “attending” the Deathmatch – could be incorporated into the ad. (The ad is designed to have a headline above it that says “Hal Niedzviecki is attending the Indie Deathmatch”.) So all this integrates your social life into commercial life and makes me slightly queasy, slightly fascinated, and, as someone who’s trying to reach a very particular cohort of potential creative writers, slightly fascinated. If anything else comes to mind about this, I’ll keep you posted. In the meantime, I really need to write a blog post about something other than FB. Get out of the house. Do something with my life.
Hal.
ps – and do consider entering the Deathmatch. It’s a really fun contest and a great opportunity for an emerging writer. I’ll be one of the initial judges to see what stories go on to get voted on. If you’re not a short story writer, please pass the link on to someone who is!
2008,
18:24 GMT
Bits and Pieces: Hal's Upcoming Weekend, More on Facebook Advertising, playlist for Hal's 10
Posted by: Hal
End of the week bits and pieces…..
1) I’ve been really tired lately. And hungry. I think I’m getting ready to hibernate. W. is going to be away this weekend. It’s just me and the kid. I hope she takes long naps…
2) Michael, reader of the blog, sent me an article in response to my musings about Facebook ads. The article talks about Facebook’s approach to advertising and why they’re using these small low paying ads instead of massive blockbuster advertising.
From the piece:
“Mr. Rose argued that Facebook isn’t so much about explaining products as showing people which of their friends endorse them. He pointed to a campaign by Procter & Gamble that allowed Facebook users to give each other Tide vintage T-shirts (actually tiny pictures of a t-shirt).
“Tide wants to create a positive affiliation with their brand in your mind,” Mr. Rose said. “Are they more likely to do that with an ad that says ‘Hey, we’re better”? Or are you more likely to have a positive feeling if one of your friends sends you a virtual gift that is a Tide vintage T-shirt?”
Again, it’s this whole question of using people’s lifestyle inclinations as a way in. Of course that can backfire: do people who wear vintage Tide t-shirts really have an affiliation with Procter and Gamble products?
Anyway, so far the FB ads for Indie Writers DeathMatch that I’m running have had an average of about 26,000 impressions a day, with about 36 actual click throughs to the FB page for the contest. I’ve capped the amount we want to pay at $10 a day and plan to run the ad for 10 days. So in the end it’ll cost $100 for 360 click throughs. Now since it costs $20 to enter the contest (you get a subscription too) at the end of the day I only need 5 of those 360 to actually enter the contest to make it worth it. The question, of course, is whether or not we’ll get those five people through this.
3) Back to my weekend. In addition to W. being away leaving me as sole parental unit in charge – watch out kid, there’s a new sheriff in town – I’m going to be on a panel at a conference on Sunday. The conference is called Culture Congress and the panel I’m going to be on is Technology of Contact. 11:45 – 1:15 at the Lakeside Terrace, Harbourfront Centre, downtown Toronto. also on the panel are: Jacob Zimmer, Michel Lefebvre, and Peter Flemming. It’s free if anyone wants to check it or the other events out.
4) Finally, I’ve created a CD mix of Canadian tunes to send to my 1000th Facebook friend, the free thinking, home schooling blues playing Texan Marie Angell. There are 13 songs on it. Here’s the lineup: 1) “When She Appeared” – Aaron Booth 2) The Commute – The “Barmitzvah Brothers 3) Slow Recovery – Beans 4) In Her Dream – Bob Wiseman 5) Almost Crimes (live version) – Broken Social Scene 6) Pamphleteer – The Weakerthans 7) In State – Kathleen Edwards 8) I Will Not Sing a Hateful Song – Constantines 9) Almost Summer – Jason Collett 10) I’m a Mountain – Sarah Harmer 11) 38 Years Old – The Tragically Hip 12) Blackheart – Cuff The Duke 13) The Dead Flag Blues (all 16:28 of it) – godspeed you! black emperor. I’m excited for Marie to experience this cross Canada panorama of weirdness!
The Bloggist
Hey, I’m Hal Niedzviecki. I’m a writer/thinker who lives in Toronto, Ontario, Canada with my wife and daughter. Up till now I’ve always considered myself a private person. But at the same time I’m fascinated by people who effortlessly open themselves up to the whole world. So I’ve… more...
A short piece I wrote for AOLnews about why Peep culture trumps privacy online. http://bit.ly/bQECsC
New content on the Broken Pencil website! Short fiction: Shack the Clam Girl + How to Make Your Own Game Cabinet http://bit.ly/b6CHLP
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